David Jones, artist and poet (1895-1974) begins his PREFACE TO THE ANATHEMATA :

'I have made a heap of all that I could find.' (1) So wrote Nennius, or whoever composed the introductory matter to Historia Brittonum. He speaks of an 'inward wound' which was caused by the fear that certain things dear to him 'should be like smoke dissipated'. Further, he says, 'not trusting my own learning, which is none at all, but partly from writings and monuments of the ancient inhabitants of Britain, partly from the annals of the Romans and the chronicles of the sacred fathers, Isidore, Hieronymous, Prosper, Eusebius and from the histories of the Scots and Saxons although our enemies . . . I have lispingly put together this . . . about past transactions, that [this material] might not be trodden under foot'. (2)

(1) The actual words are coacervavi omne quod inveni, and occur in Prologue 2 to the Historia.(2) Quoted from the translation of Prologue 1. See The Works of Gildas and Nennius, J.A.Giles, London 1841.

Gary Foley and Bob Maza, Basically Black, ABC TV, 1973Opening on Friday 1 April, David Pestorius will present a thematic exhibition dedicated to the idea of Aboriginal humour and its manifestation in contemporary art and culture.

In his famous Boyer Lectures ‘After the Dreaming’ (1968) W.E.H. Stanner recalled an exchange with an elderly Aboriginal man whose tribe was facing extinction. Reflecting upon his predicament, the old man said “When all the black fellows are dead all the white fellows will get lost in the bush, and there’ll be no one to find them and bring them home.” The observation was related dispassionately — there were no “tears, reproaches or dramatics” — and the old man went off laughing. According to Stanner, this was exemplary of Aboriginal humour, “a wonderful gift, one they did not get from us, of taking us gravely but not seriously.” Today we see something of this gift in the works of Richard Bell (Brisbane), Destiny Deacon + Michael Riley (Melbourne/Sydney), Tracey Moffatt (Brisbane), and Archie Moore (Brisbane), presented here. At once both frightening and funny, this disarming humour is generally understood as the product of a continuing effort to come to terms with white Australia. The exhibition also features Indigenous playwrights John Harding (Melbourne) and Sam Watson (Brisbane), whose works reflect a similar sensibility, while a new piece from Watson’s ongoing collaboration with Dave Hullfish Bailey (Los Angeles) is presented alongside the ABC television spoofs ‘Basically Black’ (1973) and ‘Babakiueria’ (1986). In the process, a long and proud tradition of Aboriginal activism that embraces the agency of satirical culture is alluded to.

In scheduling the exhibition opening for April Fools Day — a day when practical jokes are tolerated — the present moment is reflexively activated in a ploy first utilised locally by another great humorist, the Melbourne artist Peter Tyndall. In 1980 Tyndall set his exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art in motion in this way, yet the show itself was a savage indictment of the repressive socio-political and cultural situation in Brisbane at the time. In a similar inversion, the artist’s mock newspaper daybills (‘SCREAMING TEENS MOB PAINTINGS’) from this important exhibition, one of which is included here, pit the solitude of the art gallery experience against the intense communal response that popular music can generate. It is a sensibility perhaps not so very different from the one that Stanner was trying to describe.

29 March 2011

Museums Australia Magazine currently features on its cover a Puppet Culture Framing System component from a 1980 exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane.

That exhibition began on April Fools Day 1980 ...

... with only one full set of its exhibition components formally on display :one Work Of Art (Painting)one (red) Puppet Culture Framing Systemone sheet of Art Titles and daily newspaper headlinesone photograph of peoples in actionone newspaper banner SCREAMING TEENS MOB PAINTINGSred fluorescent lights insidered filters on the windows

Dr Marshall is signaling here about Walsh's abilities as a gifted mathematician-gambler :"... in ways that we mere mortals don't understand".

During the program there were quite a number of references to thinking. The presenter Andrew Frost spoke with "a guru of art galleries", Jean-Hubert Martin :

AF: (... so what does he make of David's vision?)J-H M: It will certainly be controversial. I guess it will attract quite a lot of people.AF: Why do you think it will be controversial?J-H M: If a much larger public comes here they're not just going to see beautiful paintings that will please their eye but they will be challenged and forced, actually, to think and maybe to reverse some of their ideas about art and human kind, actually.

bLOGOS/HA HA particularly enjoyed something that Walsh said almost as an aside

"There's a lot less to art than people think."

The program's final act is a simple archetype. The Actor of Regard looks across the water at MONA and its reflection, then walks away...

14 March 2011

In our heap here we have a number of French cards (c.1880-90) that depict the children's game Jeu de Massacre. (Literally The Game of Massacre ; also translated as The Killing Game.)

These come to mind as we the rest of the world regard the present struggle in Libya. As discussions continue in the United Nations and elsewhere about the possibility of imposing a no-fly zone over this region, General Gaddafi 's army and air force are gradually putting down the people's rebellion of recent weeks. Everyone knows these liberty seekers will face a terrible retribution if the Gaddafi forces are successful.

In this tableau two officials of the Theatre of the Actors of Regard observe, with their hands in their pockets, the threat of an armed Government agent.

06 March 2011

After yesterday's flower therapy art group tableau this seems like an appropriate enough follow-on.

Sold as a Vintage Trade Card, we have no other clues as to its origin or intended application. It is blank on the back where usually a trade card would have an advertiser's spiel. Perhaps the open area to the right of the regarder's feet was intended as a space for a business to announce itself.Viva the mystery: let a thousand stories blossom

Which, at this moment, reminds us of the various projections visited upon Jeffrey Smart's Cahill Expressway (1962).

This image has served as the front cover image for Peter Carey's The Fat man in History and, at the invitation of Helen Daniel, as the impetus for stories by 29 Australian writers (Malouf, Corris, Disher, Foster, Goldsworthy, Grenville, Jolley, Nowra...) published as Expressway (Penguin, 1989).

05 March 2011

The idea that art makes us better people, that it heals our souls, is an anathema. In the art world, 'art therapy' is the butt of endless jokes. Nevertheless, contemporary art is riddled with therapeutic subtexts and strategies. Let the Healing Begin features works that address therapy. Some of the works endorse therapeutic imperatives, some satirise them, others are undecided. The line-up is a mix of local and international artists:

01 March 2011

Another item of interest on ABC Radio National, repeated today:Drawing a line in the sand, an interview with Deanna Petherbridge, on Artworks

Deanna Petherbridge's work has been entirely drawing focused since the early 1970s but it was in the 90s that she started to focus her thinking and research on the history of drawing as both preparation for other artistic forms, like painting, architecture and design, and a finished medium in its own right. The result is an impressive 500-page book The Primacy of Drawing: Histories and Theories of Practice.

Deanna Petherbridge begins with a reference to a Pliny the Elder and his account of the origins of linear depiction. The following extract is not from Deanna P - bLOGOS/HA HA does not yet have that book - but from the blog projection systems :

...I thought it useful to expand a bit on Pliny the Elder’s account of the origin of painting. In his Natural History (circa 77-79AD), Pliny attempts to make the compendium of information for his time. In Books XXXIV and XXXV, he discusses metallurgy, sculpture, and painting.

In Chapter 5 of Book XXXV, he writes, “We have no certain knowledge as to the commencement of the art of painting, nor does this enquiry fall under our consideration. The Egyptians assert that it was invented among themselves, six thousand years before it passed into Greece; a vain boast, it is very evident. As to the Greeks, some say that it was invented at Sicyon, others at Corinth; but they all agree that it originated in tracing lines round the human shadow [...omnes umbra hominis lineis circumducta].“

Later, in Chapter 15, he tells the now-famous story of Butades of Corinth. “It was through his daughter that he made the discovery; who, being deeply in love with a young man about to depart on a long journey, traced the profile of his face, as thrown upon the wall by the light of the lamp [umbram ex facie eius ad lucernam in pariete lineis circumscripsit].“

bLOGOS/HA HA has in its collection a number of 1880s French cards based on this story. This first one is rather straight forward.

The article at projection systems shows more depictions like this one, through to the present day.

Our collection favourite is an advertising parody of LE PREMIER DESSIN (The First Drawing) on behalf of LA PREMIER MAISON D'HABILLEMENTS (The First House of Clothing). Whatsmore, it advances the basic tableau beyond the care of human-for-human to a more enlightened human-for-other/all sentient beings. Which suggests one might reconsider the nature of the light involved in this genre.

P.S.Deanna Petherbridge is giving a series of talks around Australia. These include, on Saturday March 5, 2pm, in the exhibition Freehand: Recent Australian Drawing at Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne.